| Detroit Free Press
Tom Izzo: Michigan State ‘didn’t play very well’ in defeat in Michigan
Michigan basketball coach Tom Izzo said his team “did not play very well” in the 69-50 loss to Michigan’s No. 2 on March 4, 2021 at Ann Arbor.
Michigan State Athletics
For a brief moment on Thursday night, it looked like Michigan State Basketball was about to play a game against No. 2 Michigan. Could it be another recovery in the second half for a third loss in the top 5 in eight days?
Julius Marble II sealed Hunter Dickinson’s impulse to start the period, then hit a hook over the center of the Wolverine fledglings at the other end. Aaron Henry then drove around Dickinson for an up and down tray that apparently hung on the edge forever. The Spartans had an impulse and lost by seven.
Perhaps it would have been better if the ball continued to bounce.
The Wolverines ran away with the game from there.
Within inches of another lost ball recovering, Dickinson fell to the ground to take it out of Rocket Watts’ hands. The Spartans watched him find his way to Franz Wagner for a deep 3-point to unleash a 10-0 counter-strike, punctuated by Dickinson’s fierce dunk, which MSU failed to recover. Michigan poured to make it a 25-4 takeover en route to a 69-50 loss to the Spartans at the Crisler Center.
MSU (14-11, 8-11 Big Ten) struggled to find much in his legs, shooting only 36.4% overall and missed all nine attempts at 3 points when being overcome, 34-28. They allowed the Wolverines to shoot 50%, including 7 out of 16 in a 3 point range.
MSU hosts Michigan at the end of the regular season on Sunday at the Breslin Center in East Lansing. The complaint is at 16:30 on CBS.
The Spartans lost the last two to the Wolverines (19-2, 14-2), who won their first Big Ten regular season title since 2014 and officially ended MSU’s three-year reign as league champion with the win.
Dead legs
Henry finished with 14 points as the only Spartan to score double digits in his sixth game in 13 days. However, the junior striker missed his last six shots in the second half to finish 6 of 15 shots. He also committed four of the Spartans’ 12 turnovers.
Joshua Langford, who coach Tom Izzo said he struggled to play in Tuesday’s victory over Indiana, hit just 2 out of 10 shots and a rebound. Gabe Brown missed his only two attempts at shooting and grabbed only four boards.
[ Early highlight: Aaron Henry dunks all over Michigan’s Isaiah Livers with authority ]
And Watts, who started out as a point guard, continued his tough game with six points from 3 of 8 shots and two turns. Izzo replaced him after not getting the ball lost in the final 17:01 of the game.
The Wolverines, playing their fourth game in eight days, moved up 28 in the second half, which led Izzo to pull the rest of their starters.
Medium soft
It all started with Mike Smith and Eli Brooks of UM attacking the MSU guards in dribbling to score the first seven points of the game and team up for the first 11 of the Wolverines.
Then Dickinson, the 2.10-meter freshman, dominated Thomas Kithier over a 2-minute span by three buckets, one of which was a three-point play, easily pulling the Spartan reserve forward and scoring with his left hand while Kithier tried to stop to the right. Those seven points put the Wolverines ahead 18-10, with 9:45 to go until the end of the break.
MSU scored the next six points to pull in two, but UM rebuilt its lead with layouts by Brooks and Franz Wagner, then a 3-point by Wagner.
Henry drew Dickinson’s second foul and ended a three-point play at 4:07 to the end of the break. But Brandon Johns hit one end in the other end, Wagner recovered his own fault for a tray and another tray for Johns, blowing through Joey Hauser into the bucket to help UM climb, 39-28, at halftime.
Michigan had 20 of his 26 points in painting in the first half. Dickinson scored eight of his 14 points in the first half and got the game’s best score with 10 rebounds. Wagner scored 11 of his 19 points, the best of the game, in the second half, making 4 out of 6 points out of 3.
Brooks had all nine of his points and Smith four of his nine in the first half.
Contact Chris Solari: [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @chrissolari. Read more about the Spartans of the state of Michigan and sign up for our Spartans newsletter.